


safe

by corsage



Series: AFTG Bingo 2018 [2]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AFTG Bingo 2018, Gen, Platonic Relationships, jean centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2018-11-14
Packaged: 2019-08-23 18:08:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16623884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/corsage/pseuds/corsage
Summary: when they all say he is safe, he ignores them.until he doesn't.





	safe

he's safe now, they all say. _safe_. as if that is a word in his dictionary. as if that is a word that has ever been in his dictionary. _safe_ is for people who have lived lives of sunshine and rainbows, people who think failing a test, or having a verbal argument with their parents, is a terrible, terrible thing. _safe_ is not for people like him, who have lived the kind of lives the normal ones could not possibly imagine.  
  
so when they all say he is safe now, he ignores them.  
  
he knows it will not last. someone will find him; someone will come for him; someone will drag him back to where he belongs, and he will go without question, because he knows too well what will happen if he fights back. he is not kevin, and he is not nathaniel: _neil_ , as he so foolishly calls himself. this -- this façade of peace, of quiet, of another life, something renee gave him and he will forever be grateful for, even if it is fleeting -- will end. it will end, and he will be ready for it, even if the other two are not.  
  
so when nathaniel walks into his room and tells him ichirou made contact, jean knows the end has arrived. he didn't want it to, of fucking course he didn't, but it arrives anyway. like he knew it would. so he turns his head towards the shorter man, looking straight both at him and at the future that will never be different from the past, and waits for nathaniel to deliver the damning words.  
  
except he doesn't.  
  
nathaniel -- _neil_ , he is neil now, and will be until his death -- says they have orders, all three of them, and those orders are to be free. to be safe. to do whatever they want, as long as whatever they want involves exy. these are orders that come from high up, the highest one can go, and cannot be overturned by anyone.  
  
jean lets out a breath he did not know he had been holding.  
  
he transfers to USC. he meets knox, and dermott, and alvarez. he gets to know coach rhemann, who is quite literally the opposite of everything that made up ~~the master~~ coach tetsuji. these people, they're the kind he always looked down on before, because they had it so easy, could do whatever they liked without fear of true retribution.  
  
but now he is one of them, and he reminds himself of it every day.  
  
yes, he will never be dermott or alvarez, with their good humour and love for life. he will never be renee, who looks at her surroundings and sees both the good and the bad, but chooses to only acknowledge the first of those two things. he will never come _close_ to being jeremy, who shines with an inner light, whose outlook is always, always positive, no matter how tough a situation he faces. this is the man who knew what jean was and still took him in; this is the man who looks at jean even now and somehow sees potential in him, potential not for exy in general, but as a person. this is the man jean can now call _friend_. jeremy is his friend, and so is alvarez, and laila, and renee.  
  
they tell him, in their own ways, that he is safe.  
  
this time around, he believes them.

**Author's Note:**

> can you tell i gave up on thinking of a title
> 
> this was for the aftg bingo event, using the prompt "safety" from the jerejean card. tell me what you think in the comments below or on tumblr @hijaabis / @sallenore :)


End file.
